Who's the Prettiest Mermaid of Them All?
by Deanie McQueen
Summary: All in all, Sam was rather happy with the situation: his scales were smooth and well-groomed, glittering in the sunshine like glittery things.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **Mermaids terrified me as a young McQueen. I hope that in writing this, I can continue to overcome my aversion to shell-bras and fused thighs. I do very much hope that you'll enjoy.

**Who's the Prettiest Mermaid of Them All?**

**(Mirror, Mirror on the Wall)**

By Deanie McQueen

* * *

So they'd been turned into mermen.

All in all, Sam was rather happy with the situation: his scales were smooth and well-groomed, glittering in the sunshine like glittery things. Perched on a rock, Sam looked out at a calm sea and the wreckage of their boat. He privately approved of the way the water devoured the motor and the hull; the world was better off without that truly distasteful paint job, anyway. On the other hand, he suspected Dean was less than thrilled; Sam watched as his brother grumbled and flopped and eventually pulled himself up onto the rock, panting.

"Upper-arm strength!" Sam said cheerfully, flexing his muscles. "Comes in handy at times like these."

"Shut up," Dean said, breathless. Having achieved his primary goal of climbing up, he pressed his cheek into the rock and sighed. "What the hell kind of a curse is this?"

"Not sure," Sam lied. If he found himself rather enamored with his tail, that was his own business. From what he'd researched before the hunt, the curse shouldn't last more than a week. A month, at most. He bit his lip to hide his smile: a month, possibly a _year_ of pretty scales and daily swimming and befriending sea creatures. He perked up even more at a new thought. "Are there dolphins here?" he asked, and perhaps he was too eager: Dean looked up with narrowed and confused eyes.

"Why the fuck are you asking me about dolphins?"

Sam squirmed under his big brother's gaze. "No reason," he said hastily. "I am in no way concerned about dolphins."

Dean raised his head up off the rock. "Are you _enjoying_ this?"

Body nearly buzzing with glee again, Sam couldn't stop himself. "I'm not 100 percent sure, but I'm at least 70, 80 percent sure that we can talk to fish. 90 percent! The calculations were all very hasty, but I'm pretty sure."

"Are you out of your _mind_?"

"Can we give it a shot?" Sam begged. "Dolphins, Dean! Haven't you ever wanted to talk to a dolphin?"

"Not especially, no." Dean was looking at him like he had that one time when Sam was six and convinced that underwear was meant to be worn outside of clothing instead of underneath. "Can't say I've ever had that urge."

"Oh." Sam deflated a little, shoulders slumping. Truth be told, he hadn't really expected Dean to be excited about becoming a merman, but it stung a little to realize he didn't even see the advantages. Personally, Sam had never met anyone with the ability to converse with fish. Swimming along all day as they do, he imagined they must be exceptional conversationalists. Obviously, there was a wealth of fishy knowledge to be tapped into under the waves; this was something Sam fully intended to explore.

Sam turned his head to watch as Dean pulled himself up into a sitting position, letting his tail sink into the water. Dean looked incredibly glum. "Hard to drive with this," he pointed out, smacking his scaled thighs.

"But you can swim!" Sam said, eager to please. "Swim with the creatures of the sea!"

"I do not _like_ creatures of the sea!" Dean turned to yell. "I like them on my plate," he said, and paused to think. "And if I'm feeling really fucking generous, I like them in aquariums."

Sam gasped. "Aquariums are _prisons_, Dean!" Just the thought of the glass and enclosure and plastic neon weeds sent a sympathetic shiver up Sam's spine. He had a heartless cretin for a brother. "Fish deserve to be free!"

"Since when are you all Sam Winchester, Defender of Fishy Rights?"

"Why are you teasing me?" Sam looked away, doing his best to keep the tears at bay. "It hurts me when you say things like that. Your words sting."

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Dean sounded tired.

"They do!" Abandoning all pretense, Sam faced his brother again, lip quivering with the stress of the conversation at hand. "Your words sting and they burn and you can be very cruel to me, at times. People don't like being teased, and I don't see what's so terrible about speaking to fish. They could be interesting. You could make a friend!" Sam let passion seep into his speech. "You could make a friend and friends don't let friends live in aquariums, do they? I'm only asking that you have a bit of compassion!"

"Compassion?" Dean said, incredulous. "Sam, you ate a Filet-O-Fish at the last rest stop. Remember? You bitched about 'the lack of greens' and farted in the car for like two hours afterward and don't even tell me that wasn't payback because I won't believe it."

Flustered, Sam could only yell, "Compassion!"

"Filet-O-Fish!" Dean yelled back.

Suddenly remembering their current location, Sam panicked. "Keep it down! I…" He cast around for the right words. "That sandwich was a mistake." A tasty mistake that he intended to make again, but that was something Dean needn't know. In the meantime, he felt it best to avoid the topic at hand. "Let's just…talk about something else, okay? Please?"

Dean huffed, threw up his hands in resignation. "Whatever you say, dude."

Sam let the silence stretch on before clearing his throat. "Thanks," he mumbled, and busied himself with rubbing down an errant scale.

Being a merman seemed to ignite arguments and a sudden, secret urge for greasy food. He sincerely hoped the rest of their cursed days would be happier, full of fish friends and lacking in barnacles.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **I dedicate this chapter to my childhood goldfish Nigel, as he was a good and friendly fish that only had the best of intentions. I am sorry about the Windex incident, Nigel. I felt very terrible when we flushed your dead body away. RIP.

* * *

They had yet to meet a friendly fish.

This irked Sam for numerous reasons, the most pressing being that he felt like a bit of a fraud. What kind of a merman was he, that fish weren't even interested in talking to him? The Yellowtail grunts were somewhat less than cordial, murmuring collective curses and fleeing as quickly as they could. The angelfish, butterfly fish, and Opaleye perches were equally distant. Sam did manage to get a hasty hello from a very pretty pink fish, but he could have sworn its fishy eyes looked cagey.

Dean flat-out refused to speak with sea creatures of any kind, although he did seem to enjoy the fact that he could converse with Sam underwater. Neck-gills came in handy.

"Check it out!" he said now, and Sam turned away from the interesting plant he was attempting to classify to watch as Dean did a quick loop-de-loop next to the coral.

Apparently, his brother was also fond of underwater tricks. "Wonderful, Dean," Sam said, trying to sound enthusiastic. "Very nice."

"Nice and impressive?" Dean did his trick again, back arching in the water.

Sam sighed. "Nice and impressive," he agreed, and hoped Dean would leave it at that. This curse had been decidedly less fun than he'd anticipated. With no fish friends and few plants left to classify, Sam found himself missing his legs and footwear. He had no idea how they were still alive, but it seemed like they didn't need to eat. He hadn't expected to miss the feel of masticated food between his molars, but he longed for a nice salad. Maybe a full glass of Chardonnay. Bite-sized Oreos.

He hadn't told these secret dreams to Dean, though; curse or no curse, Sam was not about to give himself up for teasing and belittlement.

When he heard a near-giggle, Sam turned around to spot Dean picking up a rather hefty-looking shell. "Look, Sammy!" he called. "This thing is _heavy_, dude. And shiny! Think we can sell it when we get our legs back?"

"Dean!" Sam cried, alarmed. "That shell is likely inhabited!" Horrible images flashed through his mind: Dean bitten by an angry shell-dwelling creature, frantic swimming to the nearest beach because hospitals were not built in the ocean, interviews by trashy magazines and an eventual 60 Minute special about The Mermen Brothers: Telling their Tail and it would all be so overwhelming and his heart pounded harder with the stress. "Put it down, put it down!"

"Ease up," Dean said, although he did put down the shell. "Jesus. You're too tense."

"Am not!" Sam yelled, bubbles floating up towards the surface as a result. He flailed his arms as best as arms could be flailed 11 feet underwater. "You're far too grabby!"

"Grabby?" Dean swam over to him, close enough to poke at Sam's chest. "You're the one who's constantly sticking his face into plants!"

"Faces don't have hands, Dean!" Sam said, and felt like he was losing his mind. "Therefore my face cannot be grabby!"

"What are you _on_?"

"No grabby faces!" Sam felt as if he needed to make this clear. "I was _investigating_!"

"I don't care what you call it. S'just as non-dangerous as it is for me to pick up a shell. And, dude? You can ease up on the crankiness whenever you'd like."

"I'm not cranky!"

Dean laughed at that. "Cranky and lonely. Just because no fish will talk to you."

That hit a nerve. Sam had tried his best, he really had. He thought he was being polite and friendly, waving to them as he had. He'd even smiled. And yeah, maybe it stung a little that fish routinely swam up to Dean in a somewhat curious fashion, even though Dean ignored them and continued to pick up dangerous shells.

It all fell down on him, then: the realization that he was without a single nautical friend. He also couldn't remember the last time he'd talked to someone from Stanford, and a sharp and bitter loneliness settled in his bones. Sam thought he smelled nice. He had a wealth of information in his brain that he was eager to share; he had an excellent smile. His bench-pressing skills were rather impressive, and he had very soft hands and forearms. Jergens had seen to that. And yet, he repelled fish.

More than anything, he wanted his legs back. He wanted a really big, really fluffy towel and he wanted to march into the nearest seafood restaurant and eat plate after plate of fish with angry chomps and he wanted to do this _now_.

He sniffled.

"Aw, c'mon." Dean sounded contrite and a little hesitant. He patted Sam's shoulder awkwardly. "Don't…not _again_, Sam."

"It's all so much!" Sam wailed, hiding his face in his hands. "I w-want my l-l-legs back. I-I haven't even s-seen a dolphin!"

Just when he thought he couldn't bear it a second longer, a tingly sensation started to spread up his scales. They itched, just like his legs had itched when they'd been fused together in the first place. Breathing was suddenly harder, and a quick feel of his neck confirmed that his gills were shrinking. He tried shouting something to Dean, but he couldn't even understand himself: it all came out in bubbles, unintelligble warbles of sound.

Dean was going through the same process: slapping at his neck, trying to say something to Sam. In the next instant, both of them swam towards the surface, scales falling off as they went. They broke the surface of the water gasping for air, and immediately started paddling over to the nearest rock. Thank goodness they hadn't gone too far, or they would have been in big trouble: Sam had never mastered the art of floating.

"Dude," Dean gasped when they arrived at the rock. "I'm starving."

"Me too," Sam agreed, because he was. "Let's go back to the Impala and find something tasty to eat."

"Best idea you've had in ages." Sam felt a happy slap on his shoulder as Dean spoke.

Sam smiled back, pleased that things were starting to get back to normal.

**~Fin~**


End file.
